Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods creating enrichment center with help from Winston-Salem Foundation

This is an archived article and the information in the article may be outdated. Please look at the time stamp on the story to see when it was last updated.

Please enable Javascript to watch this video

For 25 years, Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods has been changing lives in Winston-Salem, by bringing pride, hope and a sense of community to hundreds of neighborhoods around the city. Their work would not be possible without support from the Winston-Salem Foundation.

“We think that neighbors coming together, utilizing their assets, is the way to make our community stronger. We whole-heartedly believe in Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods mission,” said Cici Fulton, Director of Marketing for the Winston-Salem Foundation.

“The Winston-Salem Foundation has been a supportive organization of the Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods for 25 years. It helped to start Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods. The support has provided small grants and operational support,” said Paula McCoy, Executive Director of Neighbors for Better Neighborhoods.

Soon, a major improvement will happen in the Dreamland Park neighborhood.

According to Dreamland Park Neighborhood Association Vice President, Lucy Vaughn, “We are starting a neighborhood enrichment center and we are using the old facility that was The Hut which was a social gathering place for this community and outside this community in the late 60s, 70s, early 80s.”

The plans are already drawn up for the 2,000 square foot, two-story building. The new enrichment center will be geared toward making community youth more well-rounded and responsible.

“After school programs, computer labs, we even want to have a neighborhood garden. Then we want to teach the younger people in our neighborhood how to cook the food we grow in the garden,” Vaughn said. A library and mentoring programs are part of the plans too.

The Greater Tabernacle Worship Center occupied the former Hut building for a time. Now, the building will become the new enrichment center.

“They're going to have a building that's been renovated by people who live in their communities. Anytime somebody actually develops and works on a project in their own community they have more ownership of it,” said community organizer, Kenneth Holly. “If we can take this Hut that has such an unsavory reputation and make it into a beautiful place that people can gather and learn to live together then we will have accomplished our goal,” said Vaughn.

The Winston-Salem Foundation was founded in 1919. It is the oldest community foundation in North Carolina and one of the oldest in the country.